Fool's Errand
by NiaUnoriginal
Summary: The peace time after the Battle of the Citadel isn't exactly quite peaceful. Other than the Citadel, it's still the same deal everywhere else. Crimes gone unpunished, the innocents still exploited, and few are fighting. This is a story of a newly established 'social service' coming into play. Timeline of chapter 1 : Late 2183. WARNING: Adult language and material


******Author's Note : ****This fic is all made up with no connection with most of ME games plot but considering some encounter with those characters. ****I'm an ****amatuer writer and ********English** isn't my first language so any constructive review/criticism would be appreciated.

* * *

In the vacuum of the Tasale system, an Asari cruise vessel, the Heiress Glory, slowly cruising her way after a jump from the Mass Relay toward Illium, the well-known hub of glamour, luxury, and liberal trade of prestigiously illegal merchandise. Within the vessel's elegant architect is bustling with corporate personnel, aristocrats, and celebrities of wide range of species.

In the seventh deck of twelve, the casino, decorated with aesthetic arcs, pillars, and colorfully illuminating from various gambling machines.

A young male human of Asian ethnic, modest height of 5'6, short dark hair, in glasses, sophisticated and attractive in appearance, and in a well-fitted azure formal suit, lays a thumb on his stubbled chin pondering where he'd place his chip on the roulette table next after his long streak of fortunes.

A crowd of bystanders, mostly asari, in awe and praise his luck, some watches with suspicion and nitpick inwardly despite the securities didn't pick up anything on him from their visors either.

"Last bet for tonight." He comments and gathers all his chips to one final daring bet on '08' "Do it!" he says.

And the wheel spins, the ball tossed, the man folds his arms and watches in anticipation, so do the crowd. Then the wheel slows, the ball lands to its place, and the holo appears over the wheel.

'08.'

He gives a loud clap and cheers. The crowd applauds.

He turns to a more supporting group of the audiences, the three asari, all young and very attractive. He smiles "I wouldn't have made it this far if you hadn't egg me. Drinks on me ladies." and proposes generously.

They giggle in delight of the proposition but then one of them suddenly has a concern frown after looking past behind the human. Her friends follow her gaze and make the similar expression.

The one in white finally breaks the awkward scenario and response. "Oh, um, we'd love that but…" Her tone hints nervousness "We have to take a rain check on that. B-but I'm sure we'll see you around." And rushed. Then they turn tail and huddle away.

_'What the hell was that about?' _The man stands confuse of the sudden change of their behavior.

"Frederick Zhou?" A feminine sub-harmonic voice inquires from behind him. He turns around and meets a turian, most likely one of the ship's security detail by the equipment and color theme of her armor. "Please come with me." She says with neutral yet demanding tone expected from a law enforcer.

He sneers. The turian's presence is definitely the reason the asari fled, he thinks. "When are you people going to quit? Look. I won them fair and square." He was questioned by the security enough to suspect that she's aiming to go there too. The unusually long winning streak, and bravado in conquering the casino like nobody's business was all product of pure luck this night but things like has no evidence to make solid claim.

She looks down, closes in her plated, green painted face to the smaller man and speaks in hush tone. "You're intel's solid and I have orders to secure your safety."

He backs away slightly with his expression turns from snide to serious. "…I see."

She grabs his shoulder and moves him. "Hell's gonna break loose. It already is judging from security's channel. Whatever happens keep your head low and stick close-"

*BOOM*

Not a moment later, there's an explosion from the casino's entrance furthest from them, gunfire cracks and screams ring through the casino hall. The raiders come in guns blazing and firing dampening mines, shocking every biotic ables to submission in their path, minimizing biotic retaliation.

"Dammit!" She hisses and taps in to her com. "HQ! They just breached the seventh deck!" She yells as she pushes Frederick to cover under a roulette table. "Berren to HQ! Do you copy?!" But she only receives static and no hint of response. "What the hell?"

The hostiles and the securities are locked in a firefight but with how limited the security personnel arms, disorganize from lack of com., and busy ushering the civilian away from the firefight the resistance is weak will break in time.

Frederick observes the attack from cover and speaks to Berren. "Anymore you can fill me in!?"

Berren arms her white heavy pistol and answers. "As you had tipped us, Terminus pirates, seemed to have stowed away from the departure, make the raid from the cargo area and seizing their way up. They probably already took over security's head quarter a few deck below us judging from the lack of response in the com."

Before he came aboard Frederick was the one provided the Intel of possible pirate attack on the Heiress to a certain authority. "And just how in hell you haven't detect them before that?!" He asks.

"I don't have a fucking clue! I wasn't assigned to cargo check! First thing first, I gotta get you out of here!" Then she quickly pans around for an exit. One is the main door further way across from them, choked with desperate civilians. Not all will make it out of the casino this way before the pirates catch up and lock it down.

Two more each side of the hall which leads to outer corridor but too open and easy to get spotted by pirate's vanguards and just as packed as the first door.

Beyond the roulette table the pair's hiding, the gunfire's dying down with most of the casualties are her colleagues. There're still a little over half a dozen of pirates left in the vicinity making a sweep for hostages.

Frederick speaks up. "Looks like a small dispatch… There's still a chance to recover the casino but we have to be fast."

"Say what?" The turian spats.

"Stay down and wait for an opening." And then Frederick suddenly stands up with both his hands in the air.

"Hey!" Berren mouths, her voice kept in her throat.

He slowly moves forward with his gaze fixed to the scene.

One pirate, a gruff human, spots Frederick. "Look at that, here's one smart enough to surrender."

"Hold there!" A brown barefaced turian pirate in the back aims a rifle.

With shaky tone and legs and nervous expression, Frederick feigns fear convincingly. "D-don't shoot. I don't do well with bullets!"

The human pirate chuckles to the turian. "Just look. Like this wimp could even kick a baby varren. Relax." And the surly pirate walks up to Frederick with a pistol in one hand. "Hands at back of ya head and kneel, kid. No funny business." The pirate says as he reaches him and aims the gun.

Frederick places his hands behind his head and slowly kneels as the pirate ordered.

Right when he's half way down, however, he launches his feet off the floor, kicks the pistol from the pirate's hold, backflips himself back to his feet and catches the pistol.

"Hah!" He cries out victoriously…

… And it would have been impressive feat if he isn't holding the muzzle pointing at his own face.

"Oh…" He utters exasperatedly. Then, before anyone could react to the antic, he attempts stabbing the pirate in front of him in the face with the pistol's grip.

"Gah!" The pirate yelps, covers his nose in pain.

Frederick quickly smacks the pirates again on the head with the gun's hilt, gets him off balance. Then he flares, grapples on the pirate's shoulders, climbs both feet to the pirate's torso and kick himself off a distance by manipulating mass effect field while the force also launches the pirate off his feet, crashes down unceremoniously and knocked out cold.

The rest of the pirates open fire after realization of resistance.

Frederick shuffles sideways to cover behind the nearest pillar. "Berren! Open fire?!" He yells to the roulette table where the friendly gun supposed to be but gets no response. He looks for her and sees she's already taken advantage of the situation to flank the hostiles. She fires Disruptor shots and takes down two targets.

The pirates briefly turn to focus on her and Frederick takes his chance, flashes the omni-tools from both his hands overloading their equipment from distance. Their guns' heat sink burst, leave them unarmed and Berren takes her shots at three more of them.

Unable to make out how sudden the tide has turned, two remaining pirates are left cowering behind a poker table. Frederick sees them, breaks cover and bioticly pulls them up. Berren has a clear shot and shoot one down with no hesitation. Then she quickly aims at the last mark.

"Stop!" Frederick shouts.

The interruption takes Berren by surprise. She raises a brow plate. "S'cuse me?"

Frederick walks up to the last pirate, the same turian that aimed the rifle at him before, flailing helplessly in the air. Once the field dies the turian falls down to his back, he grunts painfully but unharmed. The human then moves in, presses his right foot down on the turian's chest, and aims the pistol he snatched a moment ago at the turian's face. "A pip of reinforcement and I guarantee I won't miss." Frederick threatens.

"Deal! J-just don't pull that trigger! I got family! He's helpless without me!" He squeals.

Witnessing a turian pleading for his life got the human curious and he asks the one on his side. "What do you make of this?"

Berren notices it and answers. "Unlike your species, most of us aren't very good at lying. And seeing the position he's in…" She looks down to the submitted turian. "I'm inclining to believe him."

Frederick nods, lift his foot up then backs slightly but keeps the gun on the mark. "Cooperate and you might live for a reunion." He says.

"Not sure who's the victim here anymore." Berren quips neutrally and helps the fellow up to his feet.

"See if you can get anything out of him. I'll go see if there's a way to fortify this place, buy us time to decide our next course of action." The human suggests.

"I'll leave you to that." She agrees, already convinced he's more capable than she first thought. As he moves away Berren confronts the pirate with the barrel staring up the pirates jaw. "Alright, let's start off with who are we dealing with?"

He leans up the poker table meekly and answer nervously. "Mercs, pirates, usual locals of the Terminus and such gathered up and planned for some big games with lots of pay. I don't know who organized this and called the shots though."

"How exactly did you come on board without us catching anything?"

He shakes his head. "I don't have most of the details but for one thing weapons trade is legal at this ship's destination so getting geared-up for this is actually easier than I thought." He pauses briefly and swallows his nerve before continuing. "And I think we have inside help. I was packed inside some cargo with the others since before we departed and then our sleepers booked us in."

"Traitors among ranks. Wonderful." Berren sighs in disbelief. She lows down her gun and the hostility. "Appreciate that you're being cooperative. But I'd like to know just how a nice turian like you fits into the formula?"

He relaxes a little and answers somberly. "Just a resident of Omega down on his luck looking to survive and not stuck down on that station."

"And this talk of family?"

"A little brother. Almost at the age for military training… if he's registered on a turian settlement that is."

"Parents?"

He gazes down to his feet. "None to speak of. I'm his guardian and only family."

"You're not making a good example of yourself to him though."

"The kid doesn't know what exactly I'm doing... Well, at least I hope not."

Berren frowns. "Why turn to piracy?"

"Just…" He shifts a little uncomfortably, keeps avoiding eye contact with her. "I thought I could go for one ride, grab my share and whatever I could get away with, and then walk away... Before I knew it the body count, the shame… the guilt… buried me too deep get out sooner." He answers painfully and turns his head away.

Berren could not word out if its pity or contempt she feels and keeps silence.

Then he looks up to her. "What's gonna happen to me?" He asks.

She shrugs. "…That remains to be seen. You think you can accept arrest and-"

And right then all four casino entrances are closed and lock up, and a VI announcement echoes throughout the hall._ 'The seventh deck casino is confirmed for emergency lockdown. Guests within the vicinity please remain calm and cooperate with ERCS. Repeat. The seventh deck-'_

Frederick rejoins the turians. "Well thing's looking friendly here. What do we got?"

"How this mess started and a bit of sob story from his side." The turian security answers.

"So nothing useful." Frederick seems unimpressed, glares up the barefaced turian and starts cracking his knuckles. "Give me ten seconds…"

"I got the ship's schematic for coordinating the attack. You can have it, plus I'll give away our com channel." He offers with no resistance.

Berren's brows shot up in surprise. Frederick, however, looks disappointed.

"Thought you'd be happy." He asks the human.

"I had a rare opportunity to screw over a turian… and you did this, just took the fun out of it…" Frederick snidely remarks.

That got the barefaced a bit amused. "Where did you find this guy?" He asks the female turian comically.

"Right here five minutes ago." She answers with a dead tone. "So. Selling out your own people. Kind of suits you-"

"Yeah, the 'bareface' thing. I get it." He understands what she's hinting and doesn't seem to take offence. He continues. "Got no love for any of them anyway. And I'm tired of losing sleep from doing this stuff."

"Yeah, jittering over a little guy like me kinda shows." Frederick adds glibly, rubbing in the fact that the pirates didn't saw it coming.

"Heheh... But I was right." The turian admits the irony.


End file.
